What you said, about April being stressed and then shifting - that's probably the best theory I've read so far. What I still didn't get from you, is how Zoe's connected to all of that? What influence did Zoe have on April? April didn't get injured because of Zoe...

Oh, what I write is directed for everybody of course, but it's a response to what these people said .

TomerI don't have definitive answers only speculation

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Becky already pointed out that Zoe appeared to have no effect on April in that final scene. Slowing down her friends may have been it but not likely the whole answer. So how did Zoe save April? Staying with the notion that it was April's spirit that needed saving perhaps it was Zoe's presence that did the trick. April's friends became critical when she turned Zoe down. Several people told April she was wrong. That may very well have planted the seed that got her thinking. Especially the woman who betrayed her just before the final confrontation.

There are far too many references in both games to allow anyone to think April's role has ended. That cliffhanger scene was far too unoriginal to be her demise. Many characters spoke of things yet to be done by April that have not taken place, (Banda, Guardian, Lady A, Kin) and so on. Kian and the Lady having the same last name, the kin calling April daughter, Zoe and Faith being sisters, Crow being with Lady A strongly suggest she is April. Far too many messages to simply write off.

What specifically did Zoe do? I don't think it was anything related to the final scene. Likely it was simply showing up in Arcadia and engaging April. What would be neat is April shifting directly to Charlie's bar in Stark landing on the sofa.

Ragnar Tornquist may know the complete story, but at this point in time, I'm not sure anyone else does. He doesn't seem to know much about the plans for the game coming out in chapter form. It sounds like that is out of his hands and he might settle for releasing it in story format if the game doesn't work out. Maybe his storyline is too complicated for a game, especially one in short episodes. I do hope that the game does get made since so many have such a strong interest in it, but for myself I don't care all that much. They lost me when they added all those action shenanigans to the game.

Why care so much for the action parts, sierramindy? Most of them can be avoided, there are about 2 of them that are a must, and those are really easy.I don't think you need to give up on a game simply because it has an element you don't relate to much. Believe me, I didn't relate to the combat sequences either. The story + characters were simply too good, however, for me to give up on it .

oldmariner:

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I thought about that - in Dreamfall, Crow decided to be Zoe's sidekick, and to leave April after she's been selfish to Zoe. If I'm not mistaken, the game ends when Crow is "officialy" Zoe's sidekick. Could that bring up the possiblity that, somehow, Zoe is lady Alvane, and not April? (I'm relaying on the fact that we see crow + old lady at the end of TLJ 1).About Zoe affecting April's "spirit"... well, it could be, but I have to say it's really vauge if that's the case. April has shown hardly any sign of remorse or regret, not until the last second.It could be that April regained faith in some form, right before she got stabbed, seeing the Azadi apostle, Alvane, was trying to defend her. Then she was saved. But saying that Zoe affected her - it's just hard to buy it since you see that April keeps thinking the same things, acting the same way, until the minute she dies. Even in her last conversation with Alvane (the apostle), she's still the cynical April.It's really intruiging. I hope there's a good, logical, profound explenation for Zoe just standing there on the horizon, and somehow affecting April. I really do hope we're not the only ones who'r doing the thinking *cough*ragnartornquist*cough*.

I agree with you Darleen I was very disappointed in this game for many reasons. It is not on my top ten list or if it is, then barely. I am replaying the games I like best and with every play Dreamfall drops a notch.

The obverse is true with T.L.J-1 For me everything else gets measured against it and so far nothing quite gets there.

Here's a lot of speculation about our favorite girl. If you haven't played Dreamfall, don't read this!

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OK, I'll weigh in with some ideas about how to resurrect April and let the rest of you decide how high on the "cheesy" scale they are.

One thing I'll make clear at the start is that I'm not in to metaphysical or metaphorical meanings of the term "save April" that occurs in Dreamfall. It may well be so, but that's not the way my thinking goes on the subject. The phrase, to me, means that the flesh-and-blood April is saved in a flesh-and-bloodway, even if it involves magic.

Let's also be clear on what happened. When playing Dreamfall one can at any point hit the pause key and stop the game where it is. Now, when they're all on the pier Varmon (the vermin!) gives Kian a last chance to save himself by telling him to kill April and we're then presented with four choices: yes, no, stall, bargain. I played each of these through and they all result in the same outcome: Kian doesn't do it and Varmon orders one of the soldiers to "Kill her!" and the soldier thrusts his pike into her. (By the way, the only difference in any of these options is in the dialog exchanges and, let me tell you, Aprilreally has a smart mouth for someone in her position!). Anyway, I stopped the action repeatedly when the pike was thrust and a couple of times I got a pretty good picture of what happened. The blade is very long and thin, like a big razor blade, and it enters April about four inches to the right of her navel (i.e., her right side) and penetrates deeply enough so that there is some chance it partially went all the way through. The incisionstarts about even with the navel and goes upward maybe a foot. That means multiple organ damage and massive internal bleeding. At that point April grabs her side, says "Oh" and tumbles back into the water.

That's what she has to be saved from. Although under stress she might be able to regain her shifting ability, I don't believe any of the suggestions that have been made about her shifting to an emergency room in Stark where she could be saved. I'm not medical, but I really don't think medical science is ever goingto advance to the point where someone who has been cut like that could be saved. Besides, what would that have to do with Zoe? Remember, we have to be able to account for why Zoe saves her. So, this would be too high on the cheesy scale for me.

OK, a better possibility is that April reaches the end of the pier, turns, and sees Zoe on the adjacent pier a ways over and realizes that she (April) is now in mortal danger (she knows that Zoe's mission is to save her), which is not what April was expecting when she went to the pier at Na'ane's urging. So, whiletalking to Kian she moves some defensive apparatus into her midsection and isn't really stabbed, although it appears she is. It's possible, but I'd find such a resolution to be very cheesy indeed.

The only other way I can come up with right now is as follows. Na'ane is filled with despair over the betrayal she has committed, and she's in a position where she can see what's going on. She's reasonably expecting that April isn't going to be killed on the spot, because she knows that the people in power will want to make a public show of their prisoner and execute her publicly. I say that this is reasonable and Na'ane or anyone else would know this because it's in the interest of the authorities to do it this way. (April is the Scorpionand is number one on the Azadi hit list; her role as the most troublesome guerilla leader is rather similar to the one played by Mel Gibson in Braveheart and, you'll recall, they made sure to make his execution public.)

However, Na'ane then notices Zoe on the pier across the way and this makes her (Na'ane) realize that April is in mortal danger right now, contrary to expectations. This actually gives Na'ane hope that she can do something at the present moment and she moves near the fatal pier where April is. When April falls into he water, Na'ane wades out and grabs her and then uses her magical power of last resort: she transfers April's wound to herself. This is a rather suicidal or self-sacrificial magical power, to say the last. So, April lives and Na'ane dies.

The outcome is then that April's faith is restored because she knows that there are forces working which do indeed consider her to be of high importance, so much so that they'd go to these lengths to save her. (As for what Gordon told April earlier, I discount that because I trust Gordon about as far as I can throw him). Also, in the future April would have an extreme advantage over the Azadi because they would all think that she was dead! She could then freely penetrate as much as possible into the Azadi power structure as she needed to in order to thwart their plans. She could, for example, take the place of the ambassador in the tower.

So, that's where I can take it right now. As I said above, I'll leave it to the rest of you to judge how cheesy this is. Especially the awesome Becky. You know, Becky, if you're reading this, I was always aware of your Name the Game thread (I'm a veteran lurker) but never played due to strong feelings of being chicken. I am amazed that you were able to do so much of that for so long. My compliments.

Hi RayBres,Very interesting storyline that you wrote, I certainly like it, makes me feel as though April will get back to being her old self with the shifting power or whatever it is. Then everyone who was disappointed by Dreamfall can forget it. Now that you have saved April, how about Zoe? I liked her.

Finally I've been able to play this game. I say finally, not because I've really been keen to play this game "game wise", no because I have not been able "Specs wise". Upgraded my old 64MB Video card and loaded more RAM.

Yesterday evening I saw the credits for Dreamfall fade away.

My thoughts: After the previous game I did not have high expectations on this one. Dreamfall had the graphics and the story but besides that nothing more. I would like to call Dreamfall an Adventure Interactive Movie. On the other hand the story and how it was told managed to keep me interested all the way. This is one of the extremly rare adv games with total lack of challenge, that I actually grade 4/5 . (I prefere more challenges)

Just curious. Am I wrong in thinking that producers of adventure games would be better served financially if they did not require computer specs so high that it rules out the majority of users from playing a game? I wonder how many of us don't have or are border line computer owners that are needed to play this game.

Ray, I agree with Sierra on your plot idea. But I will add CHEEZY is acceptable to me if I get what I want in the next game. I don't get what I want I won't be playing.

Loony, I'm with you, it's story and characters for me. I don't care about puzzles and at times less is better.

Dust, An interesting point. I suspect it began with FPS where the high res and action are supreme. Kind of like "my graphics" are better than yours. I ask how many ways do you need to find to kill something? Those little pacman dots got boring quick. Are there any FPS/Action games circa 1990 that get the high props accorded to low res Gabriel Knight 1? So no story, no developed characters requires constant upgrade in high res etc. Just my humble opinion. Adventure games are brought kicking and screaming into that. Though I will say Dreamfall was a pleasure to look at it was still a lesser game than TLJ. Yes I too enjoy the better graphics but I could live with the quality of TLJ, BS1. Keep the good stories and characters worry less about high res. But that's not how the corporate world works. It ties into another opinion of mine about high def TV, who cares there is too little on to pay 1000's to watch.

Maybe if developers create a game with high system specs, that ensures that people keep playing the game for years as they gradually upgrade their computers? There seem to be a lot of gamers who have just played this game.

I've always thought that GK3 tanked in the marketplace because of too-high specs for its day (1999). I had a pretty up-to-date computer back then and really had a difficult time getting through the game because of graphics difficulties. I wasn't able to play it really well until I got my next computer.